Tucker Carlson Accuses Fox News of Fraud and Contract Breach

The attorney representing Tucker Carlson accused Fox News of fraud and contract breach in a letter to top officials at the network.

The letter from attorney Bryan Freedman to Fox officials Viet Dinh and Irena Briganti was sent before Carlson released a video on Twitter Tuesday afternoon announcing that he was bringing a new version of his show to the platform.

“Starting soon we’ll be bringing a new version of the show we’ve been doing for the last six and a half years to Twitter,” Carlson said in the video. “We bring some other things too, which we’ll tell you about. But for now we’re just grateful to be here. Free speech is the main right that you have. Without it, you have no others.”

Axios reported that the letter sets Carlson up to make the argument that the non-compete provision in his contract is no longer valid, which would allow him to start the show or start a new media company.

The letter said that “Rupert Murdoch himself” broke promises to Carlson “intentionally and with reckless disregard for the truth.” The letter accuses Dinh and Murdoch of making “material representations,” or promises, to Carlson that were intentionally broken, constituting fraud, Axios said.

The report said that the letter alleges the network broke an agreement with Carlson to not leak his private communications to the media and to not use his private messages to “to take any adverse employment action against him.”

It was widely reported that some of Carlson’s private messages played a large role in the decision the Fox executives made to take Carlson off the air.

The letter also alleges that Fox News broke promises about how it would settle with Dominion Voting Systems as it related to Carlson. Carlson said that he was told by a board member that the Dominion settlement was part of the reason that he was taken off the air. Fox News said that it was “categorically false” that Carlson was fired because of the $787.5 million settlement.

“Dominion did not insist on them firing Tucker Carlson as part of the settlement,” an attorney for Dominion told Axios.

The letter alleges that Briganti, Fox’s PR head, attempted to “undermine, embarrass, and interfere” with Carlson’s future business prospects, which Carlson’s team would constitute as another breach of his employment contract. The letter said they intend to “subpoena Ms. Briganti’s cell phone records and related documents.”